crazyadventuresofcrazygirl

I have a thing about microphones. They scare the hell out of me. They disconnect me from my voice, I can’t really hear myself, I don’t know how close I should stand, how loud I should speak, how much to project. Having a microphone in front of me separates and distracts me from the audience, and I can’t figure out how to tune the damn thing out and address the people on the other side of it. I am not friends with microphones. Also, I’m pretty convinced they are just lying low, anticipating the right moment to come alive and eat me.

I also have a love/hate relationship with public speaking. I can be quite good at it, in the right circumstances, and I love to do it, when I’m feeling confident. But confidence is one of those things that requires just the right combination of factors, easily lost and difficult to achieve. I’d like it to come more naturally, and we all know that means just doing it.

So last night I chose to let myself be nudged on a tide of encouragement onto the Capital Slam stage. I’ve been attending Cap Slam events since late last spring, falling in love and being inspired in equal measure. There is much to love in this talented, colourful, generously welcoming poetic collective. The stage is always a comfortable mix of new and seasoned poets, strong, supportive, funny, outspoken voices covering a broad range of topics, political, personal, and otherwise.

It was kind of a double edged sword, for me, being so familiar with the group at this point. On the one hand there were lots of friendly faces in the crowd, but on the other, there was an added sense of pressure, breaking the performing ice in front of so many poets I admire. I’d only just finished my poem hours before the slam, and I wasn’t able to memorize it, and of course I was wavering back and forth between deeming it acceptable or thinking it was absolutely horrid.

But I did it, and it was fun, I think, and the microphone did not swallow me whole, and in spite of being a bit too quiet, and stumbling slightly over the opening line, I think I did all right. I might even try it again. Perhaps. The rest of the night was perfect, the feature was one of my very favourite spoken word poets; (Kevin Matthews, check him out! http://homepage.mac.com/ktm7/); and the other slammers were all inspiring in their own right. Wondrous wordy magic.